To Be Fearful Of The Night
by mycroftgetoffmysheet
Summary: Even though his nightmares have changed, every night John Watson goes to war. So then why is he not afraid of the dark? -In which John (accidentally) finds a reason to brave his nightmares and Sherlock finally decides to come home- causing John to question more than just his coping strategies, and Sherlock to experiment with something he never thought would interest him: Family.
1. INTRO- Kidnapped

_**I**_ **_originally wanted to post this as a long one-shot, and probably will once I finish it, but I really wanted to get some feedback on the individual parts. So, this is just the intro (hence it's length). Let me know what you think! :)_**

* * *

"Though my soul may set in darkness,

it will rise in perfect light;

I have loved the stars too fondly,

to be fearful of the night."

― Sarah Williams

* * *

"Ah, Dr. Watson, I should thank you for coming."

Across the room, John Watson pinches the bridge of his nose, his head throbbing angrily. He hasn't gotten a good night's sleep since he left Afghanistan all those years ago, and the events that have occurred since have done nothing to help the matter. Before his mind begins to assign blame, however, John blinks his heavily bagged eyes and refocuses on the situation at hand. Not even the lack of sleep could put a dent in his iron will.

John is well aware that deducing the situation is completely unnecessary. Unwelcome surprises have been such a frequent occurrence in John's life these days, that he very rarely will allow himself to succumb to the comforting warmth of denial- even though the temptation sits at the edge of his mind like a discarded blanket. The reality of the situation is unappealing, yes, but he'd much rather face it sooner rather than later when It'll just be harder to accept. He never has been one to wade in slowly just to get used to the temperature.

This time, however, he finds himself wanting to be somewhere else sobadly that he closes eyes and wills himself awake, although he knows exactly where he is, whom the voice coming from the pretentious looking chair belongs to, and that he is undoubtedly not asleep. He hasn't stepped out of the car yet, though, so he decides there's still time to try and fool himself into thinking this is only a dream (or, let's be honest, a nightmare).

John Watson is a sensible man, so if he hesitates, it's because he'd rather be thrashing violently in his bed trapped in one of his nightmares rather than stuck in this very real one after having just been kidnapped by Mycroft bloody Holmes for the first time in almost six years.

Nearly six years, and John hasn't even caught a wiff of the man (not that John is particularly _sorry) _since his pathetic attempt to apologize on the morning that his own bloody _brother _was to be put into the ground.


	2. Chapter 2: Dust

John remembers Mycroft's apology- or what he refers to as "hell freezing over"- as being a rather short and (for Mycroft, at least) unsuccessful event.

Now, to _whom _exactly that posh-git was trying to make amends, John could not be certain. However, you didn't have to be the former blogger-in-residence to the world's only consulting detective to deduce that it was probably not (and most definitely should not have been) John Watson.

Nevertheless, Mycroft's apologies fell upon deaf ears.

John vaguely remembers having the nerve to laugh at the man before he bravely suggested that the bastard "bury his apologies alongside the brother that he betrayed".

_"Maybe the two of them could have a joint funeral." He spat. His words tasted more bitter than venom._

He regretted it immediately of course, but only because he knew that if he had allowed anything even remotely related to Mycroft besides Sherlock himself to be entombed with the detective in such a permanent manor, the stubborn genius would have haunted John for all eternity.

Even if he considered his body to be "only transport".

The thought made something inside his chest clench. Because even if he believed in the supernatural and Sherlock's ghost did miraculously show up, hell-bent on pestering him forever, John knows that he would never complain if It meant that he got to see his best friend again.

Or at least, he couldn't complain as much as he would if the man was actually still living.

Mycroft's face turned to stone. He cleared his throat and continued his speech.

_"You cannot begin to understand how much I regret what my actions have led to…"_

His face was so tense with frustration, John almost felt bad for the poor sap. He looked like he was about to lay a damn egg.

Instead, John wondered idly if Mycroft would try to punch him.

About midway through Mycroft's monologue, John allowed both his pride and remnants of loyalty to steer him out of the flat before his festering temper decided to make an appearance and Mycroft ended up with a bleeding lip.

Two hours (or maybe three, John lost track), three beers, and fifteen missed calls from Harry and ten from Mrs. Hudson later, and he finally decided to return to 221B to get ready for the funeral. He called Mrs. Hudson back first, and after listening to her strong opinions about his manners for a few minutes; he feebily asked her if the coast was clear.

She let out an exasperated sigh that would have put one of Sherlock's worst to shame.

_"Yes, John, the coast is bloody clear!"_

_She hung up._

When he arrived back at the flat he plaintively ignored Mrs. Hudson's insistences that he was just being silly and stubborn. Instead, he began the process of ironing out his suit. The suit he would wear to see the most brilliant, fantastic, and most impossible _prat_ that he'd ever had the honor of knowing- above ground for the last time before he was lowered into a hole in the ground.

Then, the same thing that happened that always happened. Sherlock became part of the earth.

He slowly rotted and stunk and decayed just like any other bloody thing that had ever or will ever die.

John had accepted it.

There is a phrase used during the ritual of Ash Wednesday in the Roman Catholic Church that his Father said to him one evening when he and John came across a decaying rabbit whilst exploring the small wooded area behind their home. He was young, not yet the age at which boys started think that all-things disgusting are cool, and it was getting dark. He remembers that his dad let him hold the flashlight. When they came across the rabbit (which was at quite an advanced stage of decomposition and could barely be considered a rabbit by most people's standards), John immediately cried out and reached behind him to grab the hem of his dad's shirt.

After whipping around and seeing the rabbit, rather than console his mildly frightened son the elder Watson chuckled, and then said in a low, spooky voice meant to be comical:

_"Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return."_

Now, John is not a religious man, and in all honestly the whole idea scared the piss out of him when he was growing up. However, after learning about the law of conservation of matter (matter is created from energy and changed back into energy through decomposition) he developed a sort of quiet fascination for the daunting phrase. He studied rates of decomposition quite thoroughly and even got a paper published on it in med school. After that of course, he was sent to Afghanistan, where men he barely knew as well as men he considered to be his close friends were transformed from flesh and bone and beating hearts to blood and mist; and yes, ash.

Then, on a cloudless night during a quick patrol through a deserted neighborhood on the outskirts of Kabul, John Watson got shot.

First came the words. They were thrown at him through a doorway- from the darkened depths of a nearby home. They sounded pained; like the person saying them did not want them to be said.

They were a rapid, tangled string of Arabic that John was given no time to fully translate (not that he could have).

He only understood the last part of it. It was a phrase some of his buddies that had been stationed in Iraq (where Arabic was spoken more prevalently) taught him.

It was pronounced "layla sa'eeda", and it meant "goodnight".

After the words came the noise. A loud, familiar _pop pop pop _that was a lot easier for him to translate.

Unfortunately for John, less than a nanosecond later the force of a bullet ripping through him made coherent thought impossible, much less bloody translation. He immediately fell to a heap on the ground, his eyes blinking in confusion as his mind tried to catch up.

When it finally did, John wished it hadn't.

It was chaos for a moment after that, but John was impervious to it while he laid punctured and bleeding in the moonlight. He was busy imagining that his bones were on fire.

_His skin started to bubble and crack apart and fade to black. _

_But instead of blood, hot, scorching dirt and soot and sand and gunpowder spilled from his wounds like a dam had broken. Billowing clouds of it surrounded him, filling his lungs and scratching at his bulging eyes. He couldn't be sure if the distant screaming he could barely hear over the din of gunfire and panic was coming from him or from the swirling night sky. _

_His vision began to blacken, but he did not blink or close his eyes. He did not yield to the heaviness of the night. He kept them burning and open-resolutely fixed on the silver, blurry ball of dust above him that he wasn't sure was the moon. _

_"Please God-" he pleaded through clenched teeth. Those around him probably mistook it as a groan- a last ditch effort to remain flesh. John was not ready to turn to dust. Not tonight. _

_"-Let me live."_

_ As he was slung over the back of a soldier he did not recognize and carried away from the scene, something else tickled the back of his mind. It was breathy and persistant- like a whisper._

_ A reminder._

_"Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return."_

After that-after he was shot- fascination with the phrase was subdued into respect.

Surviving a war made one wary of such truths.

However, watching a man such as Sherlock Holmes- the best and most dear friend John has ever had- being lowered into the ground led him to absolutely abhor the stupid words.

Earth to earth. Ashes to ashes. Dust to Dust.

It was always the fucking same.

Consistent. Reliable. Dependable.

Predictable.

To john, it was absolutely fucking _hateful_.

It was also just _wrong_ (wrong! wrong! wrong!). The great Sherlock Holmes would not have done what he did. He was the world's _only _consulting detective for Christ sakes! He invented his own bloody job to keep from being _bored_. He was an avid believer (and made it perfectly clear to John on a near-daily basis) that his death would be the end of everything.

The end of all hope for humanity, and the end of John.

_"Mark my words, John Watson, the day I die will be the day Anderson becomes ruler of the free world!" Sherlock exclaimed, motioning dramatically over the array of Bunsen burners and test tubes scattered and bubbling on the table. As if he actually had to _convince_ John of how ridiculous that scenario would be. As if John _wanted_ that greasy twat to be his leader. As if John would rather follow that blubbering idiot instead of the great Sherlock Holmes._

_"Think about it! When and if I die, who will be around to examine and catalogue what the boring people overlook? I can assure you John I am three more days of immersive research and an additional examination of the maximum hydrogen sulfide content produced by bacterial fermentation away from discovering an entirely new fuel source for compact motorbikes!" When John failed to respond, he turned around and deduced that his friend was putting most of his effort into fighting back a fit of laughter rather than actually listening to what he was saying._

_"What the hell are you so smug about?" he huffed in annoyance._

_John's smirk widened to a full on grin. He nodded to the area around Sherlock's feet._

_"The hem of your dressing gown is on fire."_

_Sherlock eyes widened a fraction of a second before he resumed his annoyed pout while he quickly snuffed out the feeble flames with John's favorite dishrag._

_John's grin morphed into an irritated scowl._

_"You know, Sherlock, despite what you may think, you aren't a fucking deity, and the bloody world isn't going to stop turning for the rest of us after you somehow manage to get yourself blown up!"_

_Sherlock laughed mockingly, and John had to clench his fists to keep himself from punching the self-righteous bastard._

_"Be serious, John. You will have gotten yourself shot again or stabbed, or drop dead from a heart attack or some other dull infliction before I somehow manage to be killed!_

Because John could not possibly exist in a world where there was no Sherlock Holmes. The man was selfish and narcissistic and dramatic, and this time- this time Sherlock Holmes did not get it right. John received very little satisfaction from this particular error, however. No, he had not been stabbed or shot or been struck dead by an aneurism or some other plight. He was alive, Sherlock was dead.

And with that, he buttoned he straightened his obsidian tie, brushed a sad-looking gray hair off the shoulder of his slightly-worn suit jacket (he refused to even touch the new one Mycroft had sent to the flat the day before), headed down to 221A to collect Mrs. Hudson, and slid dutifully into the cab that would take him to bury his best friend.

Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

_It is_, John often found himself thinking in the months following the funeral, _infuriatingly and gut-wrenchingly_ dull_._

His thoughts echoed through the walls of his throbbing chest, reminding him just how empty it was; causing him to wonder what had become of whatever used to reside there. His actual heart was still there, obviously. But there was _something_ missing- something important.

As he drifted off into sleep later the next day (after not having slept for He wondered if it was possible he could ever get it back, or if it was to remain buried alongside Sherlock forever.

The last night John was in Afghanistan- before he was shipped back to England with a hole in his shoulder and no clue what the hell he is going to do next- he asked his mate Amur "Murray" Reynolds, a tall, clever bloke who was with him on patrol the night he was shot and who was also fluent in Arabic as a result of growing up with an Iranian mother, what the man inside the house had yelled before John was shot.

Murray paused for a few moments to quietly search John's face. Then he muttered something that sounded close enough to what John remembered hearing- hesitating a bit before he finished with the part John already understood, "Layla sa'eed". Goodnight.

The shorter man leaned forward expectantly.

"Well Go on then," He urged.

Murray took a sheet of paper from drawer in the bedside table of the dimly lit hospital room, fished a pen out of one of the pockets of his fatigues, and carefully wrote out something before placing it carefully into John's lap.

John picked up the paper, studying the groups of curved lines and dots that he was not able to decipher.

اغفر لي، جندي شجاع.

ليلة سعيدة.

Murray cleared his throat, then repeated the phrase, this time louder and more slowly.

"Agh-fr leey-a, jundi-shjo'a. Layla s'eeda."

John blinked. Murray regarded him warily.

Or was it pity? John couldn't really tell. He didn't prefer either one.

"He said, 'Forgive me, brave soldier. Goodnight.'"

From that night- the night that Murray told him what they meant- until the night almost eight years later when Sherlock Holmes came back from the dead, his shooter's desperate plea for forgivenes followed John Watson into his nightmares.

However, It was almost never the shooter that actually said them.

Now-a-days he hears them murmered in a deep, haunting baritone from cupid's-bow lips caked with crimson that brush against his crackling skin before he feels the bullets tearing mercilessly through his chest to embed themselves in the walls of his heart.

Sometimes he's able to wake up before he starts to leak and turn to dust.

Sometimes, though, he isn't.

_Layla sa'eed_ he thinks to himself before he drifts back to sleep and into another nightmare.

Many miles away, as John works up the nerve to confront his brother, The youngest Holmes lays down on a cheap motel matress, still fully dressed in clothes stained with blood that is not his own, and closes his eyes for what feels like the first time in six years.

He thinks of London. He thinks of Scotland Yard. He thinks of Lestrade. He thinks of the lab at St. Barts. He thinks of Angelo. He thinks of Molly. He thinks of Baker Street. He thinks of Mrs. Hudson. He thinks of Christmas and his skull and his chair and his experiments and his violin. He thinks of tea and crap telly and loud typing and jumpers.

And finally, as he begins to drift to sleep, Sherlock thinks of John.

_Forgive me, brave soldier._

_Goodnight.  
_

His cracked lips begin to slowly and painfully stretch into something that could maybe, someday soon (oh god please let it be soon), turn into a smile.


End file.
